Vol. LXV. No. 2947. 
NEW YORK, JULY 21, 1906. 
WEEKLY. {1.00 PER YEAR. 
THE ELGIN SYSTEM OF RENTING FARMS. 
Increasing Fertility Through Milk Production. 
Most of the farms in the Elgin district, Illinois, are 
rented, and the system of renting is a money-making 
one for both land owner and tenant, and has a tendency 
to constantly make the land more productive. Several 
land owners who have grown too old to work their 
farms themselves, and who have moved into town and 
rent their lands, have told me that their farms were 
producing more than when they worked them them¬ 
selves, and some have said that their land produces 
more to-day that it did 40 years ago when the prairie 
sod was first broken. The business is milk producing. 
The owner of the land furnishes the land, buildings, 
permanent equipment, like shafting and engine and the 
cows. The tenant furnishes teams, implements 
and labor. The crops grown on the farm are 
fed, and one-half the cost of all feed purchased is 
paid by the owner of the land, and one-half by the 
tenant. Each stands one-half of the loss caused 
by the death of animals, and each one-half the 
loss or gain when dry cows are sold and fresh 
ones purchased in their places. The tenant 
spreads all the manure on the land and keeps an 
agreed number of acres seeded to grass and clover. 
The cost of the feed bought off the farm is de¬ 
ducted from the amount received from sales, and 
the balance of the money is divided equally be¬ 
tween the owner of the land and tenant, settlement 
being made monthly. The advantages of the 
Elgin system of renting farms are that landlord 
and tenant are alike interested in securing the 
greatest net profits from the farm, and that what¬ 
ever increases or decreases the profits of one will 
equally increase or decrease the profits of the 
other. The owner of the farm furnishes the best 
cows that he can secure, because they pay best. 
He furnishes good barns and yards, because the 
better shelter and surroundings the cows have the 
more they will yield, for each ton of feed eaten. 
The tenant takes the best care of the cows, because 
neglect lowers the yield, and whenever a cow dies 
or loses a quarter or wears, out and has to be 
sold, half of the loss comes out of his pocket. 
The tenant manures the land and works it to get 
the largest crops he can because every extra 
dollar’s worth of feed raised makes a dollar less 
to be spent in buying feed, and adds a dollar 
to the profits. Landlord and tenant are equally 
interested in buying feed that will make the great¬ 
est net profit, and consult together as to what 
feed to buy to mix with that which grows on the 
farm to return the most money. 
The Elgin system of renting land insures the 
keeping of the live stock up to the full capacity of 
the land. Most of the milk produced is sold to 
the Bordens; this requires a high quality of prod¬ 
uct and insures good prices, and every tenant is anxious 
to keep more cows rather than less. The land is kept 
constantly improving. The general rule is to keep only 
as much land in pasture as will supply the cows when 
the grass is at its best and feed grain all the rest of 
the year. Most dairymen plan to full feed with grain 
30 months each year. The rule in Winter is to feed 
all the grain the cows will eat, and many of the ten¬ 
ants feed as high as 20 pounds of grain per cow daily. 
This makes a large amount of rich manure, and most 
of it is put on with spreaders. The interests, jointly, 
of the owners and tenants in the business provide an 
ample supply of capital to work the farms to the best 
advantage. On many of the farms mill feeds are 
bought in the Summer when lowest, and last Winter 
when bran was selling at $17.r>0 a ton many tenants 
were feeding bran purchased the previous Summer at 
$13. The farms are well equipped with buildings, 
>vater supply, gasoline engines from 12 to 25 horse¬ 
power and along the lines of the electric roads many of 
the farms have motors, buying their current from the 
electric company. 
At Elgin there is an average daily delivery of milk 
through the year of 120,000 pounds. Dundee, five miles 
north, receives an equal amount, and St. Charles, six 
miles south, nearly as much. This shows that the 
Elgin system has brought intensive farming. A few 
instances will show what is being done on individual 
farms. A farm of 100 acres has 20 acres in grass, 
every foot to be cultivated. Forty cows are milked, 
and last year’s oats yielded by weight 95 bushels per 
acre. On a farm of 230 acres 47 cows produced milk 
last year that sold for $4,200. On a farm of 120 acres 
there was $3,800 to divide equally between landlord 
and tenant after the feed was paid for. A farm of 226 
TAKING THE REINS EARLY IN HIS CAREER. Fig. 229. 
acres has a barn with stalls for 102 cows; 100 cows were 
kept last Winter and the receipts each month for milk 
were over $900. Only 60 acres of the farm is kept in 
grass. The owner has two farms—on one the tenant 
has stayed six years and on the other nine years. The 
Elgin system of renting farms can be adopted to ad¬ 
vantage where it is desired to handle horses, beef, or 
dairy cattle, hogs, sheep or poultry. It will yield much 
larger profits to both landlord and tenant than grain 
farming and has the merit of building up the soil. 
H. M. COTTRELL. 
A WOMAN’S EXPERIENCE WITH CHICKS. 
Now that the youngest chicks are past the critical 
first three weeks, we may take time to review the les¬ 
sons learned in this season’s work with incubators and 
brooders. The 400-egg incubator and 60 eggs under 
hens, to replenish the incubator after the testing out, 
were started April 7, the incubator being in the house 
cellar, which is rather dry. We experimented the last 
week of incubation, by hanging a constantly wet bran 
sack close to the lamp and running the thermometer 
a little higher, 104-105 degrees. The result was the 
best hatch we have ever had, viz., 355 White Leghorn 
chicks, (and these from pullets that had laid extra well 
since last November), but right here we made a mis¬ 
take. There were so many chicks, and the incubator 
nursery was so warm, during the second night, that by 
the time we got the brooders ready for them the next 
forenoon, although they were an unusually bright 
lot, several came from the incubator with well-devel¬ 
oped bowel trouble, and by the fifth day it seemed as if 
half of them were more or less affected, in spite of 
dry feeding, fine grit, proper temperature non-crowd¬ 
ing, etc. A few died and they were a discouraging 
lot; then I decided that something more must be 
done and that quickly. Little chickens always 
want to drink as soon as they get up in the 
morning, so, withholding all other food or drink 
until about 8 a. m., I commenced giving them 
boiled milk, as warm as they could drink it; 
gave water through the middle of the day and 
milk again toward evening. Improvement was 
quick and permanent, and after five days the 
boiled milk once a day was sufficient, but they 
had it nearly every day until they were three 
weeks old. The loss on the whole has not been 
heavy, about 12 per cent all told, and they have 
made so good a growth that at 44 days old, three 
dozen, averaging one pound each, were sold for 
broilers, 50 more have since gone, and more are 
ready at any time. 
Profiting by experience, when the second hatch 
was pretty well along, we had two brooders 
ready, and opening the incubator, quickly removed 
150 of the strongest chicks, which always crowd to 
the glass, thus preventing a recurrence of the 
sweating which the first hatch received. These 
counted up 330 good chicks, all from incubator 
eggs, as the hens had proved to be too much 
bother. Moisture and temperature as before. 
There has been scarcely a trace of bowel, or any 
other special trouble with these chicks, and except 
for the depredations of ravenous rats, whieh 
killed quite a number before the steel traps gath¬ 
ered them in, the loss would not have exceeded 
seven per cent. The greatest loss in either lot has 
been in a brooder exactly like the others, but 
which was set in a spot surrounded by low 
growing trees. Before the leaves came this did 
not matter, but the trees soon became so thick 
that the air could not circulate well there, and 
ventilation was therefore defective. I soon be¬ 
gan to find dead chicks in that brooder. They 
would go “go light,” ruffle up their feathers, 
hump around and finally die. When the brooder 
was moved out more into the open sun and wind, 
the trouble gradually disappeared. Another lesson 
learned. 
I have not tried the “all dry” method of feeding, so 
much recommended at present, but have no doubt about 
its labor-saving advantages, although I scarcely think 
it saves as much labor as is claimed for it. My chicks 
are fed bread crumbs at first, then crumbs mixed with 
hard-boiled eggs chopped fine; then johnny cake, alter¬ 
nated with bread for a few days, then johnny cake and 
small grain, gradually diminishing the cake, and sub¬ 
stituting mash, until at three weeks the cake is omitted 
entirely. I do not practice the “eat-up-quick-and-clean” 
method of feeding. It does not give the weaker ones 
any chance at all. My chicks have food of some kind 
before them most of the time. Since a little of my ex¬ 
perience as a chicken woman was printed in The R. 
N.-Y. last April, many questions have come to me from 
women interested in the subject. Perhaps it will oblige 
several to give my recipe for johnny cake. The quan- 
